Abstract
Recently, radioisotope scans have been used widely in the detection of metastatic malignant lesions. However, the evaluation of routine radioisotope scans in the metastatic tumors of the head and neck is controversial. The purpose of this study is to compare the accuracy of lung, bone and liver scans versus conventional evaluation to identify distant metastases of the head and neck. From a review of the literature as well as our experience, we concluded that lung, bone and liver scans are not useful diagnostic techniques in head and neck tumors when clinical, roentgenological or biochemical evidence of distant metastases is not present.
